Adidas has banned Sports Direct from selling Chelsea kit next season. It wants to reposition the kit as a premium product. Sports Direct founder Mike Ashley is reported to be particularly irked by Adidas’s implication that Sports Direct stores are too scruffy.
Instead of selling the shirt at Sports Direct, adidas is thought to be looking to sell the Chelsea kit through the football club and its own shops and website. It is thought this is the first time that a sports brand has tried to limit the supply of a leading football team’s kit in the UK.
Adidas has banned Sports Direct from selling Chelsea kit next season. It wants to reposition the kit as a premium product. Sports Direct founder Mike Ashley is reported to be particularly irked by Adidas’s implication that Sports Direct stores are too scruffy.
Instead of selling the shirt at Sports Direct, adidas is thought to be looking to sell the Chelsea kit through the football club and its own shops and website. It is thought this is the first time that a sports brand has tried to limit the supply of a leading football team’s kit in the UK.
Chelsea’s kit is one of the chain’s best sellers, behind that of Manchester United and Liverpool, which are made by other manufacturers. Sales of Chelsea products at Sports Direct are worth between £8m and £10m a year.
Adidas’s decision raise concern that the German manufacturer could remove other football kits from Sports Direct. One of the more valuable is Real Madrid.
Sports Direct has said that it will fight the decision, using its position as the UK’s largest sport retailer as a bargaining chip. It has ruled out taking legal action. However, Mike Ashley has indicated that Sports Direct could take a hostile stake in Adidas to exert pressure on them.